Cyberpunk 2077 Shinobi Skill Leveling Guide

Cyberpunk 2077 version 2.0 has completely revamped the game’s progression system and skill trees, and now there are five passive skills that you can level up by performing certain actions and sticking to certain playstyles during combat. Shinobi is one of the best new skills in Cyberpunk 2077. Centered around all things stealth, the Shinobi skill line will provide bonuses to your movement speed, Mitigation chance, critical damage, and even enhance certain cyberware like the fan-favorite Sandevistan. Here’s what you need to know to level up the Shinobi skill to the max in Cyberpunk 2077.

How to Level Up Shinobi in Cyberpunk 2077

Shinobi is the stealthy skill line, so you’re going to need to sneak around and eliminate enemies without being seen in order to level it up. Stealth takedowns, silenced weapon kills, and slipping through areas unseen will grant you XP toward the Shinobi skill.

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This skill line also gains some XP by using blades and swords that favor critical hits like katanas and throwing knives, which makes sense considering Shinobi boosts your critical hit chance and damage as you level it up. Blunt melee weapons and less graceful melee tools like chainswords won’t apply here though. Those will instead give you XP to other skill lines like Solo.

Shinobi Bonuses and Perks

For every 5 levels in the Shinobi skill tree, you’ll get a new bonus. Most of them are basic stat increases, but you’ll also get some perk points to spend on brand-new abilities every now and then. Since Shinobi focuses on stealth kills and blades, it rewards minor increases to critical hit chance and damage quite often.

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In addition, it also increases your Mitigation chance (a passive chance to avoid damage) when you’re crouching and reduces the stamina cost from dodging and dashing. At the final level, it will give you a staggering 40% increased critical hit chance when using the Sandevistan cyberware and completely removes the stamina cost for all types of movement as well.

If you’re going to be dodging and dashing around combat encounters, silently picking off foes and chopping them to bits with a razor-sharp katana, then the Shinobi skill line is for you. Since it’s leveled up simply by playing the game and sticking to a stealthy playstyle, leveling should come naturally. If you want to power level the skill, then try grinding supply drops and other randomly occurring combat encounters in the new Dogtown district introduced in the Phantom Liberty expansion.